Failure to atone. The true story of a jungle surgeon in Vietnam. Allen Hassan. Sacramento: Failure to Atone Press, 2006 (272 pp). ISBN 978 0 9776049 0 6.

Dr Hassan’s background is remarkable. He was a United States Marine Sergeant who qualified in veterinary medicine before becoming a doctor and serving two terms as a civilian in Vietnam, later completing a degree in law. From this unique perspective he presents disturbing insights and images of the Vietnam War. His clinical volunteer work was in the battered province of Quang Tri in mid 1968, and the experience completely altered Hassan’s life. The core of the book is a harrowing episode — the massacre of 40 infants, all shot in the head, apparently by his own Marine Corps — and his efforts to get to the truth behind this tragedy.

Several of the 774 doctors despatched by the American Medical Association’s Volunteer Physicians for Vietnam have contributed stories from their own tours of duty. Also acknowledged is the work of civilian teams from other countries, including Australia and New Zealand, and there is praise for the US medical corpsmen who, of necessity, undertook major clinical responsibilities.

Surgical triumphs and disasters, atrocities on both sides and the despair of embittered servicemen are all recounted, but it is the bigger picture that haunts Hassan’s conscience: the courage and dignity of the Vietnamese people; the death and destruction wrought by futile bombardment of innocent civilians; the failure of aid programs to concentrate more on preventive medicine, public health and training; and guilt that his country is making the same mistakes in Iraq.

The book is well bound, with an arresting full-colour dust jacket. Within, unfortunately, the photographs are mediocre and the text poorly edited, uneven and repetitious. Nevertheless, it should be read, not least for such accounts as the mutilated soldiers kept in Vietnam to avoid lowering morale back home, and sinister activities by the CIA. Scarcely believable, but sadly convincing.